5 Things I’d Feel Mixed About Having Named After Me

1. A pump-house. “Wow! A municipal building named after me! A little… windowless shack… hidden from public view… that belches fluid. For… me… wow…”

2. A disease. You found it, you made a medical advancement… but now people have to be told in solemn voices that they’ve contracted… you. Seems like scientists might see this as an opportunity to get back at bullies from their childhood. “This puny, brainless ear parasite? That’s you.”

There’s a John Cleese Landfill in New Zealand. What’s up with that, Kiwis?

3. A landfill. “As I stand here, on this lovely summer afternoon, I’m reminded –oh, Jesus the wind shifted! Aagh! My eyes! Oh, God, what the hell is that stench!? Gyuuaarrrgh. Anyway, thanks for throwing a bunch of broken, soiled, unwanted shit in the dirt and thinking of me.”

4. A gulch. Just the sound. Gulch. Gulch, gulch, gulch. River, lake, even a stream: all dignified and eternal. A gulch: You did something, who cares what, here’s a gulch, don’t let it go to your head, no one really likes you because you look like someone whose pants smell bad.

5. A law. If there’s a law named after you, either something happened to you, or you did something so bad people made a law to stop it from ever, ever happening again.

California has “the Tom Cruise law.” Think about it.

Advertisements

Share this:

Like this:

Related

About The Byronic Man

Recently voted "The Best Humor Blog in America That I, Personally, Write," The Byronic Man is sometimes fiction, sometimes autobiography. And sometimes cultural criticism. Oh, and occasionally reviews. Okay, it's all those different things, but always humorous. Except on the occasions that it's not. Ah, geez. Look, it's a lot of things, okay? You might like it, is the point.

John Cleese rubbished Palmerston North, so Palmerston North rubbished John Cleese. (he called the small North Island town “a great place to commit suicide” after a tour visit there). We lovingly refer to Palmie as a “hole”, and I can’t say John Cleese was wrong, but its citizens love it, and their revenge was at least imaginative!

Odd story: I met Gary Larson at a party once, but he denied it was him… sort of. I saw him and said to my wife, “I think that’s the cartoonist, Gary Larson.” (how obscure is that?)

I went over and asked, and he said yes, we talked for a while and then he said, “Oh, but, of course, I’m not THAT Gary Larson, the cartoonist.” So… you’re telling me I saw a stranger, pulled “I think that’s a cartoonist whose been off the radar for 15 years” out of the air, that IS your name, but you’re claiming to be a DIFFERENT Gary Larson? Fine, I won’t ask you to draw anything. Whatever.

Always hanging out next to it, so when you hike by, they’re all, “YEAH, bitches! It’s MY GULCH. Bow to the gulch master! You checking your map to see what gulch this is? I’ll save you some time, here’s my driver’s license! HAHAHA! Gulch-less loser!”

Oh, I would love to be named after a gulch! I should be so lucky. My family always says someone pulled a “Darla” whenever someone does a really klutzy move. Such as driving your bike into the back of a parked car or tripping over a blade of grass. (two things I’ve actually done)

I once rode my bike full speed in to the back of a parked car. I wound up doing a flip over the top and landing on my feet. It was AWESOME. Except my bike was wrecked, and I dented the car, and I was totally uncool about it all, what with the flipping out and “didjaseethat? didjasseethat? didjaseethat?”

I was beyond uncool about mine. No flipping, just a sad smack into the bumper, then my bike slowly tipping over in slow motion, trapping me beneath, my shoelace stuck in the chain. This is just a typical day for me.

What’s weird is this happened when I was visiting my brother in Corvallis. I blame Oregon for our bike mishaps.

Seems like having a drink named after you would be easy. Just throw a bunch of stuff together. Rum, gin, butterscotch schnapps, capers, and Dr. Pepper. Boom. Done. No one would drink it, but it’s yours.

Unless it was some terrifying, freaky sexual position that would get you slapped just for mentioning. Like “Gomorrah.” I always wonder what they were up to. We talk about “Sodomy” but no one ever says they got “gomorrahed” last night. They must have been in to some freaky, freaky shit.

I think it’s the one about ditching your wife of almost 10 years because the property division laws change if you divorce someone after 10 years. Nicole Kidman got dumped by him right before their 10th anniversary.

I have left instructions in my will (well, it’s a Word file called “Death,” anyway) that since my family isn’t wealthy enough to establish a scholarship in my name or get a building named after me at my alma mater, I will settle for a memorial restroom in the campus library, where I pissed a lot. How much do you have to give for that? If it’s too much, I’ll just take a stall. That’s right. One stall.

Airports. I live spittin’ distance to John Wayne Airport and I don’t know if I’ve ever heard anyone refer to it without their explicative of choice preceding his name. Plus, I hate airports. 🙂

Also, Dave Barry Slept Here was a fabulous book because he is hysterical. Gary Larson is an extremely kind and extremely strange man from the few times I’ve met him. And, maybe you could give all the cool dinosaurs a first name, and they could keep their family name– that way, there’d be no confusion.